Sen. Dan Watermeier

District 1

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I introduced LB 793 before the Judiciary Committee this past week, at the request of the Nebraska Attorney General’s office and county sheriffs. Currently, our statutes don’t prohibit the introduction of contraband into a jail, other than something that is useful for escape. LB 793 retains the prohibition on implements for escape but expands it to include other items considered to be contraband that have no place in a prison, jail or other detention center, such as controlled substances, weapons, explosive materials, cell phones and metal files. Under current law, an inmate may possess any number of items without fear of facing more than in-house discipline. The person providing the inmate with such contraband, can’t be punished for any offense, other than possibly losing their visiting privileges. This poses a risk to the inmate, other inmates, and especially the detention facility staff.

LB 793 also amends the statutes pertaining to the assault of an officer, emergency responders, and certain employees to specifically include county jailers and juvenile corrections officers. The need for the change in assault statutes became clear two years ago when a juvenile corrections officer was assaulted and murdered by a juvenile inmate in a western Nebraska juvenile detention facility. Since the “Assault on Officer” statutes don’t clearly cover juvenile corrections officers, had the employee not died, the inmate could not have been charged with an enhanced penalty and would have been charged with a lesser crime based on the level of injury of the employee.

I also introduced LB 952 before the Health and Human Services Committee. It recognizes that efficient and reliable statewide out-of-hospital emergency medical care is a primary and essential service. It also requires county boards to ensure the availability of emergency medical services to its residents. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the counties will be managing or paying for such services, as this requirement could be met through arrangements with existing providers.

If a local community finds it must quit providing EMS, due to recruitment problems, a surrounding town may generously decide to expand their services to provide residents with protection. However, these other locations shouldn’t have to be responsible for this.

In 2004, in their Five-Year Report to the Legislature, The Nebraska Board of Emergency Medical Services stated that although the citizens of the State have benefitted from a largely volunteer EMS system for many years, there is no statutory requirement for the provision of those services. If EMS systems fail, a crisis could occur with no governmental responsibility to ensure the provision of services.

I realize this is a controversial issue, as it could have a financial impact on counties. However, I felt that it was time to start a serious conversation on county oversight of emergency medical services.

Furthermore, LB 952 alters the make-up of the Board of Emergency Medical Services. Currently, the 17-member board is only required to have one member who is a volunteer emergency medical care provider. My proposal would increase the number of volunteers to 3 on the board, ensuring better representation in rural Nebraska.

Debate on the floor this week centered on LB 188, which was the bill I introduced to define “innocent third party” in police pursuits. After surviving a cloture vote on General File, LB 188 fell two votes short of the necessary 33 votes on the cloture motion on Select File. Consequently, the bill will not be debated again. Since the Legislature had not defined the term “innocent third party”, the courts had judicially done so, leading one Supreme Court judge to suggest that the Legislature might want to narrow the court’s definition, as he didn’t think that some of the persons qualifying for $1 million in damages as an innocent third party were what the Legislature intended, such as a passenger in the fleeing vehicle with meth on him and drinking from an open container of beer. However, a number of attorneys in the Legislature didn’t support the recommendations from the Supreme Court judge.

As we continue to debate bills that have been prioritized, I encourage your input. I can be reached at District #1, P.O. Box 94604, State Capitol, Lincoln, NE 68509. My email address is dwatermeier@leg.ne.gov and my telephone number is (402) 471-2733.